Robbie looked down. He didn’t do as I said. Instead, he flung the mitten at my face and ran, stomping hard on the ice as he went. He gave me a hard shove as he passed, and I stumbled back and fell on my butt. The spider crack grew larger, bigger, slicing apart the ice beneath me. Before I could even move, the surface gave way.
The icy surge of water sent my body into shock. I kicked my heavy boots and bounced up to the surface. Robbie was long gone. No one was here to help. I reached for the edge of the ice, but it was too slippery to hold. I tried to keep my head above water, but my wet snowsuit and heavy rubber soles dragged me down.
Someone shouted my name. Someone was running toward me. All this time, I thought it had been Oscar, but in my memory now, it wasn’t. Oscar stood at the edge of the lake, and he looked scared. He also was holding Olivia back, because she wanted to run after me. He was shouting.
Someone else was coming out to me, crawling on all fours, carefully distributing his weight on the ice.
It was Jude, whipping his plaid scarf from around his neck, knocking his own glasses off. They fell into the water and sank beneath the frigid surface. “Here! Grab this!”
Oscar appeared next, having handed over Olivia to an adult. He grabbed Jude’s feet. They both helped pull me out. But Jude was there first.
How did I forget that detail?
A rogue lake wave slapped away the memory, and I wasn’t a little kid anymore, and it wasn’t winter, but fall, and the water was cold but not freezing. Jude waved at me frantically from the dock, as he flipped a foam life preserver into the water, attached by a bright orange rope—the preserver the city put there as a safety precaution the year after I fell in. It landed a foot from me, splashing water in my face. I grabbed the ring, and Jude pulled me, just like he had all those years ago, when he’d fished me out of the ice.
I coughed as he tugged me out of the lake, my jeans soaked and dripping, Olivia’sKENOUGHsweatshirt plastered to my chest, my hair a matted, wet mess.
“You okay?” he asked me, eyes bright with concern.
“You. It was you.”
“Me what?”
“You pulled me out of the l-lake,” I sputtered.
“I didn’t think you wanted to take a morning swim,” Jude said, logically. “Was I wrong?”
“Notnow,” I whined. “I mean, of course you fished me out of the lake now. I mean, back then. When we were kids. On the ice. You pulled me out.”
Understanding dawned on his face. “Me and Oscar,” he corrected.
“Yeah, but you were there first… Your scarf. You saved me.”
“I know,” Jude said. “Come on. Let’s get you away from here.”
“You lost your glasses.”
“Yeah. Mama wasn’t happy about that. Would you do me a favor?”
“What?” I asked, shivering as my wet clothes stuck to me. Water droplets dripped off my nose, plunking on the dock near my soaking-wet Converse.
“Stop trying to kill yourself in this damn lake!”
“Very funny. The water isn’t even that cold,” I lied as I shuddered in the early morning chill. Jude whipped off his flannel shacket and covered me in it.
“Where’s the Wagoneer?” I asked, teeth chattering.
“Went off that way,” Jude said, nodding toward the shoreline drive. He rubbed my arms, trying to warm me.
“Why did you come after me?” I asked him. “You could’ve fallen in. You could’ve died, too.”
Jude looked puzzled. “I saved you because it was the right thing to do.” And there, in that one line, was Jude.
The right thing to do. He was always doing the right thing. Whether it was dangerous or not. Whether it was hard or not. Jude’s moral compass never faltered.
And it was then that I realized Jude didn’t just follow the rules when it was convenient, or because he was scared of breaking them. He followed the rules out of a sense of moral obligation. For a greater good.
Then I saw the sheriff’s red and blue flashing lights heading toward us.
